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DEATH OP MAJOR ANTHONY MORRIS, Jb., 

Described in a Letter written on yire Battle-field, near Princeton, 
BY Jonathan Potts, M.D. 

ANNOTATED BY THE KEV. EDWARD D. NEILL, PRESIDENT OF MACALESTEB COLLEGE, MINN. 

The letter of Jonathan Potts, a copy of which is here 
presented, is in the possession of Howard Edwards, of Phila- 
delphia, whose great-grandmother was a sister of Anthony 
Morris, whose death is therein related. As the writer of the 
letter was a descendant of one of the first settlers of Philadel- 
phia County, and it relates to an important skirmish hi the 
war of the American Revolution, it will not appear out of 
place in a publication of the Historical Society of Pemisylvania. 

Dr. Jonathan Potts was the grandson of Thomas Potts, 
who, at the age of nineteen, in A.D. 1699, was married at 
Germantown by Friends' usage, to Martha Kewrlis.' John 
Potts, the Doctor's father, was born in Germantown A.D. 
1710, and was married April 11, 1734, by Friends' usage, to 
Ruth Savage, of Coventry. He died in 17G8, and in an 
obituary in the Pennsylvania Gazette, is described as " a gen- 
tleman of unblemished honor and integrity, known, beloved, 
and lamented." His mansion, built at Pottsgrove, is still 
seen. Dr. Jonathan Potts was his seventh child, born April 
1, 1745, and educated at Ephrata and Philadelphia. In 1766 
he and his friend Benjamin Rush went to Edinburgh, for 
medical study. In May, 1767, he was married to Grace 
Richardson, and in the summer of 1768 graduated at the Col- 
lege of Philadelphia, as Bachelor of Physic, at the first 
granting of medical degrees in America. In 1771 he received 
the degree of Doctor of Medicine, at the same time that Ben- ^ 
jamin Dufiield, who afterwards married his sister Rebecca, 
obtained the Degree of Master of Arts, and delivered a poem 
on Science. Dr. Potts commenced the practice of his profes- 
sion at Reading. "With the deepest interest he watched the 

' Now Corlies. 



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Death of Anthony Morris, Jr. 

discussions in Piirli:imont relative to tho American Colonies. 
His family was divideil in sentiment. Ilis brother John 
clung to the Crown of England ; Isaac, a Quaker preacher, 
was a neutral until he became acquainted with Washington 
at Valley Forge ; but his brothers Samuel, James, Thomas, 
and Joseph identified themselves with the struggle for inde- 
pendence.' In 1775 he was Secretary and member of the 

' Cliildren of John Potts and Eulh Savage. 

TuoMAS, born ilay 29, l";^;). Was one of the original members of tbe 
American Philosophical Society. Member of the Pennsylvania Assembly 
of 1775. In 177G was Colonel of a Eatlalion. Died in 1785, while a mem- 
ber of the Legislature, in Philadelphia. 

Samuel., born Nov. 13, 17;!G. Member of Assembly 17G7-17G9. AVas an 
Associate Judge, and died July 3, 1793. Duiilap's "Advertiser" said : " Not 
a tear will be shed on his grave but will be from the bottom of the heart." 

John, born Oct. 15, 1738. Studied law at the Temple, London. Became 
n Judge in Philadelphia; sympathized with the Mother Country; went to 
Halifa.x ; returned after the war. 

Martha, born March 31, 1739-40; became the wife of Thomas Rutter, 
and died Oct. 11, 1804. 

David, born April 4, 1741. Asuccessful merchant in Philadelphia. His 
country-house at Valley Forge was the head-quarters of General Washing- 
ton. Died in 1798 at Valley Forge. 

Joseph, born March 12, 1742. Merchant in Philadelphia. Died at his 
residence near Frankford, Feb. 4, 1804. 

Jonathan, born 1745. See sketch. Died Oct. 1781, at Reading, and 
buried at Pottstown. 

Anna, born July 1, 1747, was the wife of David Rutter, and died in 1782. 

Isaac, born May 20, 1750. Weems and Lossing state that he was the 
person who discovered Washington at prayer in the woods of Valley Forge. 
lie died in 1803 at Germantown. A Philadelphia paper, speaking of his 
death, said : " Who, indeed, that has heard of the death of Isaac Potta, 
knoweth not that a groat man hath fallen in Israel ?" 

James, born 1752. Was a lawyer. In March, 177G, became Major of 
John Cadwalader's Battalion. Died Nov. 1788, aged 36 years, and was 
buried at Pottsgrovc. 

Rebkoca, born Nov. 3, 1753, married Dr. Benjamin DulTieUl. and she was 
the grandmother of the writer of this sketch. Died Feb. 8, 1797. Judge 
Iredell, of U. S. Supreme Court, in one of his published letters to his wife, 
writes : " Some very melancholy .scenes have taken place among our friends 
on Front Street. Our excellent friend Mrs. Duffield died the very morning 
of my arrival." 

Jesse, born 1757, married Sarah Lewis. 

Ruth, born 1758, married Peter Lohra. 



Death of Anthony Morris, Jr. 

Berks County Committee of Safety. On June 9th, 1776, he 
was appointed Surgeon for Canada and Lake George. He 
returned with Gates to Pennsylvania, and in the General 
Orders of General I'utnani, dated Philadelphia, Dec. 12, 1776, 
all officers who were in charge of any sick soldiers were 
" directed to make returns to Dr. Jonathan Potts, at Mr. John 
Biddle's, in Market Street." 

In less than a month after this order, he wrote the following 
letter : — 

letter of dr. potts to owen biddle. 

My D'r Friend : — ' 

Tho' the Acc't I send is a melancholy one (in one respect), 
yet I have sent an Exi:)ress, to give you the best Information 
I can collect. Our Mutual friend Anthony Morris^ died here 
in three hours after he received his wounds on Friday morn- 
ing.^ They were three in Number, one on his chin, one on 
the knee, & the third and fatal one, on the right temple, by a 
grape shot. Brave Man ! he fought and died nobly, deserving 

' Owen Biddle w^s a descendant of one of the proprietors of West Jersey. 
He was a brother of Col. Clement Biddle, who was present at the battles of 
Trenton and Princeton. On July 23, 1776, he was chosen a member of the 
Pennsylvania Council of Safety, and lived on Market near Third Street. 
The next year he was President of the Pennsylvania Board of War. 

^ Anthony Morris was the great-grandson of an early settler, also named 
Anthony. 

1. Anthony Morris, born August 19, 1654. Mayor of Philadelphia, 1704. 
Died Aug. 23, 1721. 

2. Anthony Morris, born March 15, 1681-82, was his grandfather. He 
was Mayor of Philadelphia in 1739, and died Sept. 23, 1762. 

3. Anthony Morris, his father, was born Nov. 14, 1705, and died October 
2, 1780. 

4. Anthony Morris, born Aug. 8, 1738 ; killed in battle near Princeton, 
Friday, January 3, 1777. 

' The skirmish took place early on Friday morning, the 3d of January, 
and did not last a half hour. Gen. Washington ordered the Pennsylvania, 
Militia to support Mercer, and led in person two pieces of artillery under 
Capt. Thomas Moulder, to a position near Thomas Clark's house, about one- 
fourth of a mile from the spot where Mercer engaged the enemy. With this 
force was the First Philadelphia Troop of Cavalry, about twenty in number, 
commanded by Captain Samuel Morris, a brother of Anthony. 



Death of Anthony Morris^ Jr. 

a much better fiitc.' General Mercer is dangerously ill indeed, 
I have scarce any hopes of him, the Villauis have stab'd him 
in five ditlerent Places. The dead on our side at this Place 
amount to sixteen, that of the Enemy to 23.^ They have 
retreated to Brunswick with the greatest Precipitation, and 
from Accoimts just come, the Hero Washington is not far 
from them : they never have Ijcen so shamefully Drub'd and 
outgenoral'd in every liespect. I hourly expect to hear of 
their whole Army being cut to pieces, or made Prisoners. 
It pains me to iiilbrm you that on the morning of the 

' John Morris, Jr., in a letter written at Bristol, two days after the battle, 
to Thomas Wharton, Fresident of Pennsylvania Council of Safety, says: 
"Please to inform my father lliat my brother S. C. Morris received no hurt 
in tlic battle, but that Anthu' Morris received a wound with a bayonet in 
the neck and a bullet in his leg." 

He was first buried in the graveyard of the Stone Quaker Meeting-FIonse, 
near the battle-field, but his remains were subsequently brought to Phila- 
delphia, and buried, at the request of his family, without military honors, in 
Friends' burying-grouud. 

The following military order was, however, issned on Jannary the 24th, 
1777 :— ^~~ 

" One Capt., 2 Sub's, 2 Corp's. 2 Prum'rs & .OO men from the garrison in 
the Barracks, to parade at the City Tavern, at two o'clock this afternoon, 
to escort the funerals of the late Coll. llaselett & Capt. Morris. The rest 
of the garrison olT Duty, to attend with side arms only. Coll. Penrose, Coll. 
Irvine, Coll. McKey. to attend as bearers." 

* The loss of American officers in prcii)ortion to the number of men engaged 
was very great. General Mercer of Virginia, Colonel ITazlet of Delaware, 
Capt. Neal of the Artillery, Capt. Fleming of Virginia, Capt. Morris of 
Philadelphia, Capt. Wm. Shippin of Philadelphia, a merchant of German 
descent who kept a store near Market St. wharf, and Lt. Yeates of Virginia, 
were among the slain. 

The Pennsylvania Journal of Feb. U, 1777, states that Yeates was only 
twenty-one years of age, possessed of wealth, that he received fourteen stabs 
and was knocked on the head with a musket after he fell, and that his dying 
airidavit was forwarded by Washington to General ITowe. A friend, in a 
poetical tribute which appeared in the same paper, wrote — 

" But oh I Bg^in my mnnpleil Yeates nppeurK, 
Excites new vcntjefince nnd provokes fresh tears; 
Behold my wounds! he says, or seems to say, 
Remember Princeton on some future day ; 
View well this body, pierced in every part, 
And sure 'twill (Ire tiie most unfeeling heart." 



Death of Anthony Morris, Jr. 

Action, I was obliged to fly before the Rascals, or fall into 
tlieir hands, and leave behind me my wounded Brethren:^ 
would you believe that the inhuman Monsters rob'd the 
General as he lay ujiable to resist on the Bed, even to the 
taking of his Cravat from his i^eck, insulting him all the 
Time. 

The number of Prisoners we have taken, I cannot yet tind 
out, but they are numerous. 

Should be glad to hear from you, by the bearer ; is the 
Reinforcement march 'd ? 

I am, in haste, your most obedient 

humble Serv't, 

JON'N POTTS. 
Dated at the Field of Action, near Princeton, 
Sunday Evening, Jau'y 5tli. 

Dr, Potts, on the 3d of April, arrived at Albany as Director 
General of the Northern Department. Among his letters in 
possession of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania is the fol- 
lowing from Dr. John Bartlett, written from Moses Creek, 
Head Quarters, July 26, 1777, at 10 o'clock of the night, rela- 
tive to the death of Miss McCrea : — 

' Barber's Historical Collections of New Jersey has the following : " Mr. 
Joseph Clark states that General Mercer was knocked down about fifty 
yards from his barn, and after the battle was assisted by his two aids into 
the house of Thomas Clark, a new house about one and a quarter miles from 
the College." Miss Sarah Clark and a colored servant nursed him. On the 
12th of January he expired in the arms of one of Washington's aids, Major 
Lewis. 

Tlie Pennsylvania Evening Post has this notice : " Last Sunday evening, 
died near Princeton, of the wounds he received in the engagement at that 
place on the 3d inst, Hugh Mercer, Esquire, Brigadier-General in the Con- 
tinental Army. On Wednesday his body was brought to this City, and on 
Thursday buried on the South side of Christ Church yard, attended by the 
Council of Safety, Members of Assembly, Gentlemen of the Army, and a 
number of the most respectable inhabitants of the City." 

For years a plain marble slab, with thi inscription " In memory of General 
Hugh Mercer, who fell at Princeton, January 3, 1777," marked the grave. 
In 1840 the remains were removed to the Laurel Hill Cemetery, and a monu- 
ment placed over them. 



Death of Anthony Moiris, Jr. 

" I have this momeut returned from Fort Edward, where 
a party of hell-houuds, in conjunction with their brethren, the 
British troop, fell upon our advanced guard, inhumanly 
butchered, scalped, and stripped four of them, wounded two 
more, each in the thigh, and four more were missing. 

"Poor Miss Jenny McCray,' and the woman with whom 
she lived, were taken by the savages, led up the hill to where 
there was a body of British troops, and then the poor girl 
waa shot to death in cold blood, and left on the ground, and 
the otlier woman not yet found. 

" The alarm came to camp at two P. M. I was at dinner. 
I immediately sent oif to collect all the regular surgeons, in 
order to take some one or two of them along with nic to 
assist, but the devil of a bit of one was there to be found, ex- 
cept three mates, one of whom had the squirts ; the other two 
I took with me. There is neither amputating instrument, 
crooked needle, or tourniquet in all the camp. I have a 
handful of lint and two or three bandages, and that is all," etc. 

On the 16th of November, 1777, Dr. Potts left Albany on 
a furlough to visit his family, and while at Reading, Pa., was 
appointed by Congress, Director General of the Hospitals of 
the Middle Department. In 1780 he was Surgeon of First 
City Troop of Philadelpliia ; ])ut did not live to see the indc- 
I)endence of his country achieved. 

At the age of thirty, he died in October, 1781, at Reading, 
and was buried at Pottsgrove, leaving a wife and fiimily. His 
executors were his brother Samuel and his old friend General 
Thomas Mifflin. 

' Jauc McCrea. 



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